Our Apartment

Per special request, here are some pictures of our apartment. We will only be here for a few months, as I am moving in with my parents (seriously) when Chris deploys.

This is our living room. Instead of investing/moving our furniture, we decided to buy bean bags when we got here. Then we found out that bean bags are expensive, so we thought about a futon. Then we found out futons were expensive, so we went back to bean bags and got some nice ones at Wal-Mart. These two were the only ones left, which is why we look like Steelers fans. Also, there is a dog bed to the right, and Eden is laying on the other one. Next to the dog bed is a door out to our small patio. Our windows look out over a grassy area that the deer and pooping dogs are fond of. And at night, we can see the city lights, which is pretty. This picture was taken from in front of the kitchen area.



Here is our kitchen area, and the dog area. The dog area is actually the dining area, but we don't have a table or anything, so the dogs got it. To the right is our front door. To the left, you can see an open space, which is the beginning of the hallway to Izzy's room. Immediately to the left, you can see half a door, which is the water heater/closet door. Perpendicular to that door is the door to our bedroom, which you'll see in a minute. This picture was taken from the living room.


This is a picture of our bedroom, which also serves as a "changing Izzy" room, and a general "stick your mess in a corner" room. That's our old queen bed, not the tempurpedic, which is a bear to move. Our night stands are our tubs that we used to move. To the right is our bathroom/closet area. To the left are windows and a door that lead onto that small patio area. The blinds to our room are often up, because Izzy loves to play with them. This picture was taken from the door to our bedroom.



This is the hallway to Izzy's room. On the left are the laundry area and the guest bath. This picture was taken from the beginning of the hallway, which is in the dining/dog/kitchen area.



This is Izzy's room. Her crib is canted, because we have to protect the nightlight, of which she has learned to remove the light cover. To the right is her closet, where she throws her clothes all over. The TV box holds her fan and humidifier when she is awake, because she knows how to turn on and unplug, and tries to plug back in.


And that's our apartment in 5 pictures. Not that big. Not too bad. It'll do for a few months.

Guaranteed to make you laugh.

Since the last videos got such a great response, I've decided to add a few more.

As with all kids, at some point, they learn that taking things and running away with them is super fun. (By the way, I found out yesterday, that dogs also learn the same thing.) So, Izzy started doing it in Arizona with the remote control, but has since progressed to taking the shirt right off of our backs. Okay, it's a hat, but it counts. And this wasn't taken the same day as the Kanye video; she is just wearing the same outfit, except for the shoes. In this video, she is wearing her monkey slippers. In the Kanye video, she was wearing her pink shoes.

Izzy + Kanye

So, Izzy LOVES to dance. She can say "Dance" and she can wiggle around to the beat. It's amazing, but she can even change the way she dances based on the song. Chris really is the one who has fostered her love of dance, because even before she could walk/sit/anything, he would dance with her while listening to music. By far, her favorite dance music is rap/r&b/hip-hop. She loves Chris Brown and Beyonce, but her favorite is Kanye. She loves Kanye. Anytime Kanye comes on the radio, she says "dance" and starts dancing up a storm. Here's some video that I took today of her moves.

Spaghetti Western

or at least Spaghetti Face


One of Izzy's favorite meals. One of our least favorite to clean up, that is why she is wearing her spaghetti shirt.

The BIG Move

Guest Blogger Christopher reporting on Big Move '09:

I know I am going a little bit out of order as Jin likes to do her posts in the order that pictures were taken, but I'm going to recap our move.

Last Tuesday is when it all really started, this is when the packers (not the football team, just Sisco and Benny) came and started boxing up our house. Izzy couldn't quite figure our what was going on, but she is so easy going that it didn't seem to phase her. She even napped while they were working which is a miracle because it seems that Benny was born without volume control and only knows LOUD!

By Thursday the only thing we had left in the house is what we were packing in the U-haul to bring with us. Jin must have developed about 37 different comprehensive lists of what to bring with us and even then we were not sure that we would have enough room. Needless to say the house was very empty.


Friday was cleaning. We had a cleaning lady come and she did most of the inside work for us (big shout out to mom for helping flip the cleaning bill). As it turns out we probably could have saved some money and had Izzy do the cleaning. I have the feeling that this would have not have been as cost effective in the long run.


Saturday it was on the road. After loading the U-haul we headed out. It turns out that list number 37 must have been the magic list because everything fit, but not by much. We had to get the car and trailer weighed on the way out of town and it turns out that the poor little Santa Fe was towing about 2300 lbs. Because Jin will be making a similar move in a couple of months, we may follow the Jennifer Starr Guide to Surviving a Deployment and purchase a newer, stronger, roomier vehicle. While we weren't the fastest car on the road, we weren't the slowest either. The first day we passed one other car, the second day four and the third day back down to one. See not the slowest.

Izzy got a little feisty at times but that is what you would expect when you travel with a 17 month old. We found a solution for that though:


As it turns out, she didn't mind because she was apparently just conducting business on the road.


We arrived in Colorado Springs on Monday and have spent the last couple days getting settled. There are new and exciting things for the dogs to see and bark at like trees and deer. Deer that come right up to our window and eat off of our neighbors back porch. Our first morning here we got quite the wake up. First it was the skunk that we are pretty sure spayed under our front door at 4 AM. Then when Jin took the dogs out at 6:30 (I had already been out with them 3 times between the hours of 11 PM and 3 AM) she was greeted by 4 or 5 deer 10 feet from our door. As you can guess our ADD pointer loves the deer.






I'm sure that there are details that I am leaving out (or conveniently forgetting) and Jin can cover those, if she chooses.

1 1/2 months later...

Soooo...what can I say...I was on a slight ANTI-blogging run. But now (for now), I'm back. Here's a quick update on what's happened.

Izzy got a great sock monkey for Christmas from her Godparents, Josh and Kal.


But at first, it scared her. So she played with the box.


And the box became one of her favorite places to sit. Until we used said box to ship something. Izzy was not still sitting in it when we shipped it.


And Izzy's obsession with boxes continued. She also developed a love of putting things on her head and walking around (i.e. towels, jackets, sweatshirts, and (of course) boxes.) She only walked into things a few times.


She seemed to think that holding the box up and peeking while walking, was somehow cheating, so she often would walk with her head up really high, and (I think) her eyes looking out the bottom.


She also has gotten even more cozy with the dogs (if that's even possible). She likes to sit by their stomachs, in between their front and back legs. She also likes to sit in between their front paws and lean back on them. And her newest thing is to sit ON them, bouncing around, while singing "duh duh duh duh" as if we were bouncing her on ours knees. The dogs LOVE that one.


She has also learned to pull open doors (no pushing yet), loves to play in the backyard, likes walking around outside with Chris to get the mail, and throws hefty temper tantrums when she doesn't get her way. She has also developed a terrible habit of refusing to have her diaper changed unless she gets gummi bears. Oh well, can't win them all!

Do dogs have belly buttons?

Izzy's new thing is to dress Eden in Paddington's hat. The other day, she and Eden sat next to me in the office for a good (nice and quiet) 30 minutes. Eden was so tolerant and patient, even though I'm sure she knew she looked silly in a yellow hat. Yellow is just not her color.

Izzy had fun putting it on Eden's head.


And then giving her hugs.


And if it wouldn't stay on Eden's head, putting it on her much more stable back.


And then putting it on her own head, showing Eden how it was supposed to look.


And then, yesterday, Chris got this awesome video of Izzy playing with Eden and the hat again. At the end, she shows her nose and her belly button, and then...well, you'll see. (The password is Izzy.) Oh, and after the title question, wait for Izzy's chuckle. It's priceless.

Izzy playing with Eden, noses and Belly buttons 2 from J Pack on Vimeo.